


A Lifetime of Clichés

by calerine



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: Friends to Lovers, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-13
Updated: 2017-07-13
Packaged: 2018-12-01 15:58:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11489757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calerine/pseuds/calerine
Summary: Nino is in love with his best friend.





	A Lifetime of Clichés

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yukitsubute](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yukitsubute/gifts).



> Shout-out to my betas H and C for coming through for me even though they're both Swamped and Busy. <3

It's been years since Aiba's called Nino like this - voice echoing of hiccups and broken words, and this annoyingly characteristic tendency to be kind.

"Well, he was a massive dick," Nino points out and Aiba makes a sound that's both agreeing and disagreeing at the same time. "No, really. No matter what you're going to say, anyone who treats anyone like that is a massive dick."

Aiba makes a sad sound over the phone, and that's Nino's cue to stop talking shit about his now-ex.

"Fine, since I'm  _already_  awake, do you want to go get ice-cream?"

Aiba sniffles, but Nino can hear the lift of his lips when he answers, "okay. But you're paying."

Nino rolls his eyes. Figures Aiba would ask. For all his sweetness and innocence, he's got the cunning of a fox. "Just this once."

Aiba whoops on the other end and Nino imagines him smiling around tear-stained cheeks, and his chest aches.

"Don't get used to it," he snaps, just to try and slow the racing of his heart.

*

They meet at the station and get ice-cream at Baskin Robbins.

It's just after noon and Nino's still grumpy and sleepy from getting home at 8am and being woken up after a long shift at the hospital. But it's Aiba, and Nino couldn't even begin to articulate the things he'd do for him, even if his weak heart didn't have a say.

Like buying ice-cream, for instance. 

"You're an idiot," he says for the 300th time in ten mins. Aiba had insisted on milking Nino's treat for all it was worth. ( _I want the most expensive thing you can put together!_  He'd crowed gleefully, dodging from Nino's hand and his cry of _I'm going to kill you!_ with practised ease that made the words trip on the tip of Nino's tongue.) He had ended up with a monstrosity of 5 different flavours; 3 in a cup and 2 balanced precariously on a cone, because ice-cream wasn't ice-cream without a cone, accordingly to Aiba.

But the day has been hot and the universe seems to be against him today, so Nino finds himself sitting in the middle of Shibuya with his best friend desperately licking melted trails of ice-cream from between his fingers in a race against time.

"I know, but you  _never_  buy anyone anything so I thought 'I need to make full use of this!', you know?" Aiba is down to 3 scoops, and Nino is falling asleep in the sun, cold beer long finished. (It was cheaper than getting ice-cream for himself, and Nino's never been much of a sweets man.)

"I don't know," and at Aiba's perplexed expression, Nino shrugs, "What can I say? I have generous friends."

*

But heartache comes and goes at inopportune moments. Nino should know this; he's an old hand at this game after all.

*

After ice-cream, they wander back to Nino's.

On the train, Aiba peers out of the rain-streaked windows at Tokyo, now-damp, now-grey again from the overcast skies and this incessant rain.

"Remember when we used to take the Sobu line together after club?" Aiba sounds wistful for a time that Nino's happy to see gone.

"With our gloves and sweaty uniforms?" The image makes him smile though, the two of them, one lanky and one short, talking too loud on the train and scandalising old ladies into shushing them.

"Yeah," Aiba trails off, looking pensive and Nino finds himself jumping in to keep the demons at bay.

"Remember how Ohno-kun called us the Sobu Twins?" It makes Aiba laugh, delight chasing away the clouds in his eyes.

“Of all things to be known for,” Aiba slings an arm over Nino’s shoulders and he makes a face, but doesn’t shrug him off. “It’s not as if we did anything to be earn that name.”

“We did take this godforsaken line every single day though - I’d call that an achievement.”

Aiba giggles, high and through his nose, and like when they were kids and Nino had said something particularly naughty. “Who else was going to take us home if we didn’t?”

“You could have asked any one of your suitors, I’m sure one of them would have said yes.” He ducks away from Aiba’s arm. It’s too hot, too humid to be so close even if his heart wants him to get closer still.

 It makes Aiba pull a face at him, even though he is 34 years old and too old to be so childish.

“Don’t pretend like you weren’t popular too, Nino.”

“Good children don’t tell lies, Aiba-chan, or I’ll tell your mum.”

*

They end up eating dinner in a Chinese restaurant near Nino’s apartment, sitting on the old vinyl counter seats and burning their tongues on gyoza filling.

Aiba orders too much. Nino watches him eat, sipping at his own beer in the usual steady downhill spiral of being in the periphery of Aiba’s heartbreak until the warmth in his belly has spread all over, and it’s easier to lean into thoughts of Aiba’s lips on his than think too much.

The chef gives them leftovers to bring back home, telling Nino off for not being around recently and then telling him that doctors should know how to take care of themselves. (Nino’s stopped correcting him; if he wants to think Nino’s a doctor, who is Nino to say otherwise?)

It’s dark by the time they get back, stumbling into the genkan step with their shoes still on. 

Aiba is laughing at something Nino doesn’t remember saying, so heavy and familiar at his side.

“I’m not brushing my teeth tonight. I’m putting myself first!” Aiba declares, going straight to Nino’s room. By the time Nino gets there, he’s starfish-sprawled on the bed and the pillows are everywhere.

“I’m not letting you come again if this is how you’re going to repay my kindness.” Nino says, even though he’s crawling into bed too, limbs too heavy to be upright for any longer.

“Lies, all lies.” Aiba tugs hard on Nino’s arms and sends him tumbling into Aiba’s side, face smushed into Aiba’s chest.

He smells like sun-dried laundry and all the things Nino hasn’t said, and he’s _so tired_  from fighting this. But then he thinks about Aiba’s choked voice over the phone this morning and knows that this is not the time.

They lay in silence for a while, Nino shifting onto his side and Aiba winding arms around his midriff. Neither of them have turned on the lights or opened the windows, and Nino watches the orange light of passing cars elongate and slip away on the screen of the dark TV, the sound of wheels splashing through puddles.

Aiba’s breathing evens out and Nino is occupied with how his dreams tease fingers at his thoughts when, “you’re right.” Aiba’s voice is scratchy and drowsy.

“I’m always right.”

A breathy laugh, tucked into the back of Nino’s neck like a secret. It makes him think of all their sleepovers when they were in elementary school, staying up playing video games in the dark quietly so Aiba’s parents wouldn’t wake up in the next room, then sleeping till noon curled up in each other’s arms.

“He was a dick, towards the end.” Aiba is muffling quiet sobs in Nino’s shirt, soaking through the fabric and all the choice words Nino would use to describe Ryota withers on his tongue.

Instead, he settles on, “I’m sorry you made a mistake of dating a demon. I mean, to be fair, he did look very human-like so it could have happened to anyone, really,” Nino waits until Aiba has quietened before he turns around to wrap his arms around him, tucking his head on Aiba’s shoulder and his thumb stroking a knob of spine. 

It makes him chuckle, and Nino thinks of his laughter lines and the wrinkles around his smile, the history of his joy, and knows that he is lucky enough to have this.

 *

 

(In typical Aiba and Nino fashion, it will take them too long but eventually, Nino will say something uncharacteristically heartfelt, but sober under dim barlights 

Aiba will move in with Nino, because Nino is a lazy bastard who couldn’t be bothered carting all his game consoles to a new home. Nino will spend the first year surprised every day that he has this; janken battles for who will hang out the laundry, stealing each other’s food in front of the TV after a long shift, and waking up to Aiba coming in through the front door with heavy shoulders and a relief etched into the lines of his face.

And when they go drinking at the Chinese restaurant near their apartment, Aiba still orders too much, but now, it’s not from heartache.)

**Author's Note:**

> Pinch-hit for Nino Exchange this year and wrote this in 3 hours half-asleep after work, but I quite like how it turned out.


End file.
